£240m Liverpool industry and academia-led science programme iiCON offers £1.5m to 11 innovation projects using novel ways to fight infectious diseases. Tony McDonough reports
Multiple projects focused on combating infectious diseases will share £1.5m of funding secured via the Liverpool-based iiCON programme.
Founded in 2020 with an £18.6m UK Government grant, iiCON brings together industry, academia and clinicians to accelerate the discovery, development and deployment of new treatments and products for infectious diseases.
It has since grown into a £240m programme working with a global network of more than 1,009 organisations. By enabling industry access to world-leading facilities and expertise, it has supported 36 new products to market.
This has led to more than 5bn units of life-saving products and treatments reaching communities across the world. It has also created 770 jobs and bolstered the region’s R&D infection spending by £859m.
Now after holding sandpit events (innovation workshops) in Liverpool and London earlier this year iiCON has offered a total of £1.5m to be shared across 11 separate projects. The cash was secured from UK Research and Innovation (UKIR).
Projects include new tests related to avian flu, novel technologies to tackle diseases such as tuberculosis, research into antibiotic use, rapid diagnosis of antimicrobial resistance and development of coating to reduce disease transmission via surfaces.
A number of organisations both in Liverpool city region and beyond and among those who will receive funding. Locally they include Merseyside Refugee Support Network, NHS Merseyside Social Inclusion Team, LYVA Labs and Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.
Click here to see a full list of the organisation and details of the projects.
They have received network funding of up to £50,000 or proof of concept funding of up to £150,000 and are to be completed over the next six to nine months. The aim is to encourage the development of disruptive technologies and methodologies.
The sandpit events were attended by more 200 multi-sector stakeholders who collaborated to identify fruitful areas for exploration, including the integration of AI and machine learning into infection R&D.
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Professor Janet Hemingway, founding director of iiCON, said: “Combatting the transmission of infection is one of the most significant health challenges of our time, and its urgency continues to escalate.
“We are thrilled to announce the 11 successful innovative projects dedicated to addressing this issue. It is essential that we harness novel, disruptive technologies to advance our efforts in tackling the spread of infection.”